Questions tagged [lightning]
For questions referring to atmospheric electricity. This can be referring to the atmospheric electricity that presents itself usually closely with storms and thunder.
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Plausible method to massively augment a lightning strike
Descriptions
As I mentioned before the main antagonist/villain of my story has the ability to control electricity. This electricity control is fairly powerful (think on the level of enel from one ...
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Can lightning destroy 1 meter of concrete and steel with ease?
There is a character in my story who is a cyborg and as such they have decided to incorporate an electro laser into their body which has the same voltage and amperage as normal lightning due. An ...
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Can modern civilization maintain itself under an Earth constantly bombarded with lightning?
I have an Earth unknowingly tainted by a drop of blood shed from a Lightning Deity. The divine blood corrupted the world such that it is always experiencing lightning strikes at an omnipresent scale. ...
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Evidence of lightning-caused mass extinction
For context, modern humanity can travel to alternate versions of their planet through portals. They still only have our modern day technology and science. They stumble upon an Earth tens of million ...
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A lightning bolt strikes the White House. How much power would it require so that its exuded energy can ignite the entire landmass of the USA? [closed]
I have a Lightning Deity in the Gulf of Mexico that wants to intimidate modern Earth and decides to throw a lightning bolt at the White House. As the lightning strikes the White House, the heat, light,...
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What is the most logical way to have my dragon breathe lightning? [closed]
For my story I'm writing, I can't decide how I want my dragon to breathe, or, for lack of a better word, exude lightning. The dragon is rather large; I'd say Game of Thrones size when fully grown. The ...
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What would happen if lightning couldn't strike the ground due to a layer of unconductive gas?
My world has an upper atmosphere similar to Earth's, and a lower atmosphere compromised of Sulfur Hexafluoride and water. In between is a layer of clouds. Massive treelike sulfite structures stretch ...
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Is there a material lightning does not strike?
I was imagining the possibilities of creating a ship mast which could not get struck by lightning. Is there a material it could be made of that would never get struck by lightning?
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A person in the air being struck by lightning
In the climax of a story I'm writing, the antagonist is flying high in the sky(she has wings) during a thunderstorm, while wearing a full suit of armor. She is struck, and nearly killed. But lightning ...
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Harvesting lightnings for energy...in real life Mordor!
I planned to have a region on my world that is similar to Mordor, as in a place with near constant thunderstorms and lightning strikes, about 30 times per minute at peak for at least 25 hours at night ...
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Thunderstruck and tesla beetles: Are they feasible?
I my game project, "The Von Neumann Project," you play as an android attempting to colonize a hostile alien world, and turn it into into a thriving factory planet. One of the many odd and ...
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Effectiveness of lightning weapon on a medieval sea
How effective would a charged weapon be on a medieval sea
Alright, so imagine we have a barge — a city barge, similar to some of Technochtitlan raft farms. Due to (magicly caused) climate conditions ...
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Surviving and using lighting strikes
Character 1 has the ability to summon thunder strikes down on himself and has learned how to redirect them through the surface of his skin.
He uses a 25 kilograms 5 meters long metallic pole to call ...
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Horizontal Lightning Bolt
So in real life, if you get hit by a bolt of lightning and don't die from it, you just sorta spasm out a lot and fall down in pain whilst the energy of one billion volts of electricity courses through ...
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Could a flying creature get it's electrical energy from storms?
I've got some draconic creatures that can store and discharge/manipulate electrical energy. (think flying electric eels.) Would it be at all plausible, given the right conditions, for them to somehow ...
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How does legendary mage avoid self electrocution while disregarding hidden rules?
There is a hidden rule for all mages that is to jump every time when casting a lightning spell to prevent self electrocution, how this work is as follows:
First the mage recites an incantation to ...
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How would a black lightning storm work?
"If you shine a low-pressure sodium lamp on a yellow sodium flame, the flame will be black." I shamelessly stole the above text from somewhere but it whetted my curiosity.
I am wondering if ...
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Would O'Neill cylinders experience thunderstorms, if not how would you generate/simulate one?
ASSUMPTIONS
The OC in question is a standard paired OC similar in size to Island 3 5 miles (8.0 km) in diameter and 20 miles (32 km) long. It is a temperate biome akin to southern France with some ...
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How can I make my often-lightning-struck mesa sound like giant drums?
Premise 1: I prefer to know if it's possible to realize this without much handwaving (hence the science-based tag) but, as this is going to be in a fantasy setting, answers which make it possible with ...
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How can a being that can create electric attacks use targeted lightning storm strikes?
I found one question that deals with how to make lightning from clouds strike a target person,
Can we make lightning strike a certain person? but I am looking for something that doesn't involve ...
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Collect lightning energy [duplicate]
Lightning is an abundant source of energy.It is clean,huge and renewable.Is there any way to collect the energy from lighting,store it and reuse later?
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How could a lightning magic user fly?
My first post on Worldbuilding, hello all!
So my question is what could be some interesting logic or thoughts behind having a lightning magic user being able to fly?
To quote another user who wanted ...
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How can I ensure my Evil Tower is always stormy?
It's been a good year for me as an Evil Overlord. Lots of princess kidnapping turned into sizable ransoms, several of my Doomsday Devices were sold for high prices at auction, and my Minions have been ...
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The opposite of lightning or force used as a weapon, what could it be? [closed]
WHAT IS THE OPPOSITE OF LIGHTNING?
If there was a sword that controls lighting, what would its elemental opposite be?
The idea is that one is positive and one is negative. One pulls electricity from ...
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What would the benefits be for augmenting a sword with electricity, lightning, or something of the like? [closed]
I’m mostly looking for if it would cut better, but anything helps.
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Harvesting lightning from within the thunderstorm with a Faraday Cage
Lightning is abundant in some places in Earth. Attempts had been made it collect it.
Laser triggered lightning below is the closest attempt.
By the time it reaches the ground most of the power ...
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Building a drone for gas giant flight: Lightning considerations
A previous question's answer established that naturally occurring positrons could be gathered through positron-emitting isotopes. I've started looking into means that these isotopes could be gathered ...
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Storms in Space
By request, these are the two previous questions in this "series":
Low Voltage Lightning and Alien Nitrogen
How To Make Lightning
I recently asked a question about lightning storms on planets. One ...
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How To Make Lightning
I am writing a sci-fi setting with space travel. In this there is an alien world important enough to require that I put thought into the ecosystem.
Unfortunately, due to plot reasons, the usual ...
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What happens if two lightning bolts collide?
I'm writing a high fantasy story in which two characters, one a protagonist and the other an antagonist, happen to be capable of shooting lightning bolts. So I was wondering... what would plausibly ...
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What are short-term defenses against massive elegtromagnetic disruption?
A society comparable (in resources, technology, economics and politics) to present day Earth is gearing up for war. There is a weapon which causes massive, widespread electromagnetic disruption. Like ...
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Would lightning strike a flying island?
Looking for someone with meteorology/physics knowledge to help with this one.
Let's say I've got an island that floats in the sky--nothing special, these are a staple of fantasy these days. For ...
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Ideas for a hero using lightning to incapacitate captors - on a ship in the middle of an electrical storm [closed]
I think it's mostly in the title - but I have my team of 'good guys' who come across an enemy ship in a mother of an electrical storm. They will get captured by the bad guys, but I would like the hero ...
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How to make exomoon lightning storms
I have a terrestrial moon that I would like to have spectacular and frequent lightning storms. What atmospheric compositions and conditions could cause this?
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The moon orbits a 21 earth-mass ...
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How would the terrain of a desert be impacted by abnormally-frequent lightning strikes?
As usual, another interesting scientific question, taken from /r/worldbuilding.
Would it mean any difference for a desert, where the amount of threatened objects is so low? Or would it form the ...
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Could a weapon utilize artificial lightning? [duplicate]
We all know how lightning works: The clouds have a strong static charge and release that charge towards the ground. But could it be used as a weapon?
Would a weapon of the following description work? ...
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Lightning-Powered Renaissance Golem Army
The massive Golems are nearly impervious to harm. Thanks to the New Golem Army, the nascent Dutch Republic's castles and forts are now safe from harm. The century-long external threat has been finally ...
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Is it possible to have lightning create complicated fulgurite geometry above ground on a magnetically active world?
Hanorane (han-or-a-ney) is a moon with a dynamic surface covered in charged sand particles that drift in massive rivers suspended by electrostatic levitation. The only solid ground is the worn and ...
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Breathing lightning
This question is partly a nod to the current fortnightly challenge.
In many fantasy settings and resources, there are creatures capable of, or described as, breathing lightning. How might a creature ...
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Lightning striking full plate — what’s the damage to the wearer?
I have a knight fighting a dragon with an electric breath weapon, I'm wondering what would actually happen when the knight was struck by the weapon, assuming it has the power of a 'regular' lightning ...
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Polarity of a planet's lightning strikes reversed?
On Earth, the planet itself is negatively charged and the clouds are positively charged, causing lightning to travel from the clouds to the surface. While there are significantly smaller wisps of ...
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